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I am happy to see Brother on the wholesale tank bandwagan. Given the derogatory advantage margin from the inkjet cartridge, its reluctance is understood, but the brother is expecting to catch this compact and competitive price supertinner with the launch.
Brother DCP-T580DW is a more economical model in a new refillable range that is aimed at home office or micro-business. It is an original color A4 all-in-one with major features such as auto-duplex printing, high-razor scanning and Wi-Fi, with airprint compatibility. It has no automatic document feed (ADF), rear paper tray or color display, which is reserved for a slightly more expensive brother DCP-T780DW, which also performs better on testing.
But what it puts to this minor multifunction printer ahead of the cartridge-bound competition is its four ink tanks and four bundle bottles of ink, so that you are able to print 7,500 black and white pages and 5,000 colors. For comparison, HP Envy 6530E comes with a 120 back page and 75 ink containing enough ink cartridges. You can see why consumers are choosing tank printers. But how does this entry-level model to brother compare with the best ink tank printer? I tested it to locate it.
Brother DCP-T580DW: Design and Building
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Glasses
Type: Color Tank Inkjet Printer
Work: Print, copy, scan
Connectivity: Ethernet, USB, Wi-Fi
Data Storage Slot: nobody
Maximum print speed: 16ipm (mono)
Maximum paper size: A4/Legal
Print quality: 1,200 x 600 dpi
Apple airprint: Yes
Consumers include: 4 bottles (7,500 black, 5,000 color page)
Dimensions/Weight: 15.35 x 13.50 x 5.87in (WXDXH) / 17.42LB – 390 x 343 x 149 mm (WXDXH) /7.9 kg
Brother DCP-T580DW is actually a second-generation tank printer, after the odd-looking brother DCP-T525W, which was specially sold through Amazon. This version sees that the brother takes his tank printer to the UK for the first time and it looks much more sophisticated, with four tanks integrated into a commendable compact design that does not look larger than the cartridge printer.
To achieve this clean form factor, their capacity has decreased, rather than exiting ink reservoirs as before. In 48.8 ml, these tanks are smaller than the 65 ml ecotank of appson or 70 ml of HP.
In fact, it is slightly lower than some of the brother’s high-capacity encounter tank cartridges. However, it is still more than your average cartridge and it allows this printer to be sufficient to sit on his desk without stealing too much space.
Only one paper input and its cassette, which holds up to 150 sheets of letters, legal or A4 paper, is slightly stretched from the front. The top has a flatbed scanner, but no ADF and display is a very basic single-line affair surrounded by a normal array of buttons on a tilt panel. Power and USB cable are on the left to the left instead of the rear, which may suit your setup, or it may not be.
Brother DCP-T580DW: Facilities and Specifications
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For an entry-level business inkjet, brother DCP-T580DW has a sensible specification. The speed of print is quite fast for an inkjet on 16imp in black and white pages or is in 9ipm color, while Wi-Fi is 5GHz with airprint compatibility. The print resolution is given as 1,200 x 600DPI, in which ink drops are given through 420 nozzles. It is 70 duct for each color and 120 for black.
The main paper tray is your only input option and can hold up to 150 sheets of plain A4, letters or legal paper and the weight range is 220gsm. It is worth noting that the step-up model adds a rear multipurpose paper input that is capable of weighing up to 300 grams of coarse paper. The DCP-T780DW also has a large performance with color screen and 20-sheet ADF which makes the DCP-T580DW look very light on features.
Brother DCP-T580DW: Setup and Operation
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The printed quick start guide is very clear, and you probably won’t need it. Just load your paper, plug in and turn on. The on-screen prompt will ask you to enter the date and time and fill the ink reservoirs. I recommend downloading the app with a brother named Smart Connect, which will help you to join your Wi-Fi network.
This iOS/Android app is also very good to print from a distance and check the status of your printer. With such a small black and white display on the printer, your smartphone offers a better user interface.
Putting ink in tanks is a clean and easy process, or at least it should be. Bottles have the same ability to tanks and their neck only fit its respective tanks, so you cannot mix any frightening. I did not leave a drop until I made the mistake of giving the tanks only participating and changing half the empty bottles in the box. what a mess!
Unlike Epson, HP and Canon’s bottles, the brother’s bottles do not seal again, even when you feel that you have spoiled the lids on the tight. To be fair for this printer, it asked me to ‘fill’ the tank, so I will not marked it for human error.
Brother DCP-T580DW: Performance
For me, brother DCP-T580DW worked well, started immediately and promised quickly. It wins slightly annoying when printing, so it is less calm than most inkjates, but there were no examples of handcart, low or blot during tests. The ADF managed to drag into multi-page documents and copy them without any problem and duplicate was quite loyal.
The quality of print is acceptable, but something is disappointing at this price point. Starting with black text documents on plain paper, it is clear that the brother is using a dye-based black ink, which is fine, but the characters look slightly less bold than black. With the office-oriented printer you often find dye-based C/M/Y and a pigment BK because the text looks sharp and is more scratched and faded resistant, but I do not necessarily expect it at this budget level.
Color ink looks quite bright, so mixed color documents look fine. This happens when you get to print images and photos on coated paper that you see the lack of proper expansion resolution. The resolution quoted 1,200 x 600DPI is similar to the more expensive brother DCP-T780DW, but it is obtained using half the numbers. The brothers give very noticeable dip in the lower-specific printhead image quality on the DCP-T580DW. Overall print performance is probably sufficient for most office documents, homework and handouts, but it is not very good for photos.
Brother DCP-T580DW: Consumer ingredients
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The brother comes with three bottles with 48.8 ml yellow, cyan and magenta and 108 ml bottle of black. It should receive around 5,000 color pages and 7,500 black and white and brother-ink around the cost of a replacement ink around around US $ 47 or £ 35, which is a very low cost-cost-page. And there is nothing to stop you using cheap third party ink.
Brother DCP-T580DW: Maintenance
Being an inkjet printer, brother DCP-T580DW is liable to dry and print badly or is not at all if left unused for the length of time. The problem is stopping the ink tube and the solution is flushing them with more ink. At least bottled ink is quite cheap that without disturbing. This printer has unusually versatile maintenance options with the choice of three flushing cycles of different strength depending on the position of your tube.
Brother DCP-T580DW: Final decision
I got a lot to praise about brother DCP-T580DW, from its compact size and fast duplex printing, from its low TCO (total cost of ownership). The list of features is rather thin because there is no ADF, the display is small and only a paper input. But at least it ticks all major boxes, such as auto-duplex printing, A4 scanning, dual-band Wi-Fi and a lot of bottled ink in the box.
It is a pity that print performance for this price category is below the average, with dull dye-based blacks and photos that lack fine expansion. For most purposes, it is probably quite good, but it is difficult to recommend brother DCP-T580DW, when slightly more expensive brother DCP-T780DW offers all missing features, more ink and much better print quality.
For more print solutions, I have tested and reviewed Best home printer You can get now.
